Brick Church Mound and Village Site
A small section of undeveloped land
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 Location within Tennessee today, marker is former position of Mound A
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| Location |
Nashville, Tennessee, Davidson County, Tennessee,  USA
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| Region | Davidson County, Tennessee |
| Coordinates | 36°14′50.89″N 86°46′32.48″W / 36.2474694°N 86.7756889°W |
| History | |
| Founded | 1000 CE |
| Abandoned | 1499 |
| Cultures | Mississippian culture |
| Site notes | |
| Excavation dates | 1877, 1969, 1971-2001 |
| Archaeologists | Frederic Ward Putnam |
| Architecture | |
| Architectural styles | Platform mounds, palisade, |
| Responsible body: private | |
The Brick Church Mound and Village Site (40DV39) (also known as the Love Mounds and the Brick Church Pike Mound Site) is a Mississippian culture archaeological site located in Nashville in Davidson County, Tennessee. It was excavated in the late nineteenth century by Frederic Ward Putnam. During excavations in the early 1970s the site produced a unique cache of ceramic figurines very similar in style to Mississippian stone statuary which are now on display at the Frank H. McClung Museum. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) on May 7, 1973 as NRIS number 73001759 although this did not save the site from being almost totally destroyed by residential development.
Like many other sites in central Tennessee during the Mississippian period the Brick Church Pike Mounds Site was a multi-mound village with an encircling defensive palisade. The site had a large platform mound (Mound A) 23 feet (7.0 m) high and 155 feet (47 m) on the north–south axis by 147 feet (45 m)on the east–west axis and several smaller mounds. On a ridge next to the mound were many stone box graves of a type found throughout the Cumberland region. Most sites during this time and in this general location were located along tributary streams of major rivers. Larger sites such as this were not drastically different from the dispersed hamlets of their hinterlands but they did offer increased protection during times of instability. While politically autonomous from each other, sites in the area still shared a material cultural with other sites in the region such as Sellars, Old Town, and Mound Bottom. Brick Church Pike Mounds was first described and excavated in 1877 by Frederic Ward Putnam and given a brief mention in the writings of William E. Myer in the early twentieth century though it is unclear if he actually visited it. After this the site remained mostly undisturbed except for farming until the latter half of the twentieth century. During the last 30 years of the twentieth century the site was almost completely destroyed, razed for the building of a residential area and the Ewing Baptist Church, although salvage archaeology did take place.
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